Toronto Maple Leafs: Measuring The Babcock Effect

When Mike Babcock was hired by the Toronto Maple Leafs, the fans knew good things were coming and were just waiting for the coaching guru to make his mark on the team.

Throughout this past season, the team looked more organized, and the future looked promising, yet the Toronto Maple Leafs kept losing. So in reality, where they actually playing better, and if so….. why did they finish last?

In this article, we will look at three different Leafs seasons; the shortened lock-out season when the Leafs made the playoffs (2012-2013), two seasons ago (2014-2015), and last season (2015-2016). Using these three seasons, we will compare and contrast the different teams in order to measure Babcock’s impact on the team thus far.

The 2012-2013 Season: Lockout Season
Coach: Randy Carlyle
Record (W-L-OTL): 26-17-5
Seed: 5th in East
5v5 Corsi For%: 44.1 (30th)
5v5 Shooting% : 10.57 (1st)
5v5 Team Save%: 92.39 (15th)
Point Leaders: Kessel (52), Kadri (48), Van Reimsdyk (32), Franson (29), Phaneuf (28)

During the lockout season, the Toronto Maple Leafs had a good amount of skilled scorers such as Kessel, Lupul, Kadri and James Van Reimsdyk. Secondary scorers included Grabovski, Macarthur, Kulemin. Even the defense on paper was pretty good.

Up front, Bozak played first line minutes with Kessel since Carlyle elected to put Kadri with inferior wingers like Macarthur and Kulemin. In addition, Grabovski was up and down the lineup even becoming a fourth line center for some of the year. In addition, the Toronto Maple Leafs lead the league in fights, carrying at least two fighters (remember those?) in their starting lineup for most of the season.

Carlyle had a talented group overall to work with which was clearly able to score on the limited chances his systems created. Their inability to suppress shots lead to themselves to getting only 44.1 percent of the even strength shot attempts that season. As a result, I think it is safe to say the Leafs spent a lot of time in their own end under Carlyle.

At times, Reimer had to stand on his head to keep his team in games. Many analytics experts said that sooner or later, this high shooting percentage and relying on good special teams would not hold up. Yet, the Toronto Maple Leafs still were able to finish fifth in 48 games, and take the Bruins to seven games.

The 2014-2015 Season: Carlyle to Horacek

Coach: Randy Carlyle, Peter Horacek
Record (W-L-OTL): 30-44-8
Seed: 7th in Atlantic
5v5 Corsi For%: 46.4 (27th)
5v5 Shooting% : 7.51 (18th)
5v5 Team Save%: 91.84 (24th)
Point Leaders: Kessel (61), Van Reimsdyk (56), Bozak (49) , Kadri (39), Franson (32)

The Leafs lineup was quite similar to the lockout season’s. The core was a bit more “experienced” and they added some players like Clarkson, Komorov and Winnik.

Unfortunately, that thing those stats guys were talking about…. It happened. The 2014-2015 season started like how the lockout season went. The Toronto Maple Leafs were not scoring as often, but they were still capitalizing on a limited amount of scoring chances.

After Christmas, their shooting percentage dropped drastically, their goaltending let them down, and their possession…. well that didn’t change at all. They won one game in January leading to a Carlyle firing. Peter Horacek got named interim head coach.

Under Horacek, the Toronto Maple Leafs shot suppression actually improved, while maintaining their shot attempt-for total, but the Leafs front office already decided their future plans. Before the deadline, Franson, Santorelli, Winnik, Gunnarsson and Clarkson were all dealt for picks, prospects and/or cap space. The beginning of the rebuild was underway.

The 2015-2016 Season: Babcock’s Toronto Debut

Coach: Mike Babcock
Record (W-L-OTL): 29-42-11
Seed: 8th in Atlantic
5v5 Corsi For%: 51.3 (13th)
5v5 Shooting% : 6.36 (30th)
5v5 Team Save%: 91.93 (25th)
Point Leaders: Kadri (45), Parenteau (41), Komorov (36) , Reilly (36), Bozak (35)

Due to the rebuild, the players Babcock had to choose from were subpar to say the least, especially when compared to the the teams’ Carlyle was able to ice. After selling a lot of their top players, the Toronto Maple Leafs shooting percentage was never going to stay high.

Due to the lack of talent on the team, the Toronto Maple Leafs powerplay ranked second last. At even strength, even the goaltending was some of the worst the team has seen in years at (don’t let the door hit ya Bernier).

The most interesting statistic change was their team 5v5 CF%. Carlyle took years to try and fix their shot differential but never could. In contrast, after one year Babcock has already made this differential positive, even though he has worse players to deploy. This improvement in itself should get Leaf fans excited.